1. Field
The subject matter disclosed herein relates to methods and systems relating to ranking functions.
2. Information
The rate at which information is created in the world today continues to increase. There is personal and professional information, public and private information, entertainment and scientific information, governmental information, and so forth. There is so much information that organizing and accessing it can become problematic. Various approaches to data processing strive to overcome such problems.
Thus, data processing tools and techniques continue to evolve. The different evolutions attempt to address how information in the form of data is continually being created or otherwise identified, collected, stored, shared, and/or analyzed. Databases and data repositories generally are commonly employed to contain a collection of information. Communication networks and computing device resources can provide access to the information stored in such data repositories. Moreover, communication networks themselves can become data repositories.
An example communication network is the “Internet,” which has become ubiquitous as a source of and repository for information. The “World Wide Web” (WWW) is a portion of the Internet, and it too continues to grow, with new information effectively being added constantly. To provide access to information that is located in and/or that is accessible via such communication networks, tools and services are often provided that facilitate the searching of great amounts of information in a relatively efficient manner. For example, service providers may enable users to search the WWW or another (e.g., local, wide-area, distributed, etc.) communication network using one or more so-called search engines. Similar and/or analogous tools or services may enable one or more relatively localized data repositories to be searched.
A tremendous variety of different types of information are available via, for example, the WWW. So-called “web documents” may contain text, images, videos, interactive content, combinations thereof, and so forth. These different types of web documents may pertain to different domains. Web documents can therefore be formulated in accordance with a variety of different formats. Example formats include, but are not limited to, a HyperText Markup Language (HTML) document, an Extensible Markup Language (XML) document, a Portable Document Format (PDF) document, H.264/AVC media-capable document, combinations thereof, and so forth. Thus, unless specifically stated otherwise, a “web document” as used herein may refer to source code, associated data, a file accessible or identifiable through the WWW (e.g., via a search), some combination of these, and so forth, just to name a few examples. Regardless of the format, content, and/or domain of web documents, search tools and services may attempt to provide access to desired web documents through a search engine.
Access to search engines, such as those provided by YAHOO!® (e.g., via “yahoo[dot]com”), is usually enabled through a search interface of a search service. (“Search engine”, “search provider”, “search service”, “search interface”, “search application”, etc. are sometimes used interchangeably, depending on the context.) In an example operative interaction with a search interface, a user typically submits a query. In response to the submitted query, a search engine returns multiple search results that are considered relevant to the query in some manner. To facilitate access to the information that is potentially desired by the user, the search service usually ranks the multiple search results in accordance with an expected relevancy (e.g., relevancy score) to the user based on the submitted query, and possibly based on other information as well.
However, with so much information and so many different types of information being available via different data repositories and/or communications networks, such as the WWW, there is a continuing need to refine the search ecosystem to better help a user access the information that he or she is looking for. In short, there is an ongoing need for methods and systems that enable relevant information to be identified and presented in an efficient and comprehendible manner.